pearlers make ready to sail.
My father is Bias Salazar and for many years he was the most famous dealer in pearls anywhere on the Vermilion Sea. His name was known in Guaymas and Mazatlan and Guadalajara, even as far away as the City of Mexico, for the fine pearls he wrested from the sea.
Last July on my birthday he made me a partner in his business. It was a grand fiesta and people came from the town and from miles around to drink chocolate and eat pig roasted in a deep pit. The biggest part was at the beginning of the feast when my father brought forth a sign, which he had hidden until that moment, and nailed it over the door of the office. The sign said in tall gilt letters SALAZAR AND SON, and under this legend in small letters was the word
Pearls.
My father beamed with pride. "Ramón," he said, pointing at the sign, "Look! Now there are two Salazars to deal in pearls. Now they sell twice as many pearls as before and finer ones. They sell pearls in all the cities of the world, these Salazars!"
I looked at the sign and blinked my eyes and felt like shouting. But at that moment my father said something that made me feel like a boy and not like a partner in the House of Salazar.
"Ramón," he said, "pull down your cuffs."
I am not scrawny, yet I am small for my age and thin. My wrists are very thin and my father was ashamed of them. Being so big himself, he did not like to think that his son was puny nor that anyone else thought so.
Afterward my father took me into the office and showed me how to open the huge iron safe. He showed me the trays lined with black velvet and filled with pearls of all shapes and colors and sizes.
"Tomorrow," he said, "I will begin the education. First I will teach you how to use the scales with accuracy, for the weight of the pearl is very important. Then I will explain the many shapes, which is also very important. Last of all I will show you how to hold a pearl up to the light and tell just by looking at it whether it is of excellent quality or good quality or only poor. Then, by the time you are as old as I am, you will be the best pearl dealer in all of our country and you Can teach your son everything I have taught you."
That was the happiest day of my life, that clay four months ago, and yet it was not all happy. Besides the embarrassment when my father had said, "Ramón, pull down your cuffs," there was also a big fear that kept worrying me.
As my father explained everything I had to learn, I feared that not soon would I have a chance to sail with the fleet. For many years I had dreamed of the time when I would be old enough to go. When you are sixteen, my father had said, you can sail with me and I will teach you how to dive in the deep water. Many times he had said this, and I had counted the weeks until I would be sixteen. But now that I was sixteen at last, I could not learn to dive for pearls until I learned many other things.
There is a small window in our office. It is only a slit in the stone and set high in the wall, and it looks more like an opening in a jail than a window. It was built that way so that not the smallest thief can squeeze through. Yet it gives a fine view of the beach and the Bay of La Paz. Furthermore, the men who work there on the beach opening the shells cannot tell whether they are being watched or not, which sometimes is a good thing.
On this morning as I sat at my desk I could see the five blue boats of our fleet riding at anchor. Water casks and coils of rope and supplies lay on the beach ready to be carried aboard. My father strode back and forth, urging the men to hurry for he wanted to catch the outgoing tide.
The tide would turn in less than three hours, but in that time I hoped to examine all of the pearls that lay on my desk. There were still nine of them to look at and weigh and duly note in the ledger, so quickly I set to work.
Under the desk, wrapped in a neat bundle, were my singlet, cotton pants, and a long, sharp blade my
My father is Bias Salazar and for many years he was the most famous dealer in pearls anywhere on the Vermilion Sea. His name was known in Guaymas and Mazatlan and Guadalajara, even as far away as the City of Mexico, for the fine pearls he wrested from the sea.
Last July on my birthday he made me a partner in his business. It was a grand fiesta and people came from the town and from miles around to drink chocolate and eat pig roasted in a deep pit. The biggest part was at the beginning of the feast when my father brought forth a sign, which he had hidden until that moment, and nailed it over the door of the office. The sign said in tall gilt letters SALAZAR AND SON, and under this legend in small letters was the word
Pearls.
My father beamed with pride. "Ramón," he said, pointing at the sign, "Look! Now there are two Salazars to deal in pearls. Now they sell twice as many pearls as before and finer ones. They sell pearls in all the cities of the world, these Salazars!"
I looked at the sign and blinked my eyes and felt like shouting. But at that moment my father said something that made me feel like a boy and not like a partner in the House of Salazar.
"Ramón," he said, "pull down your cuffs."
I am not scrawny, yet I am small for my age and thin. My wrists are very thin and my father was ashamed of them. Being so big himself, he did not like to think that his son was puny nor that anyone else thought so.
Afterward my father took me into the office and showed me how to open the huge iron safe. He showed me the trays lined with black velvet and filled with pearls of all shapes and colors and sizes.
"Tomorrow," he said, "I will begin the education. First I will teach you how to use the scales with accuracy, for the weight of the pearl is very important. Then I will explain the many shapes, which is also very important. Last of all I will show you how to hold a pearl up to the light and tell just by looking at it whether it is of excellent quality or good quality or only poor. Then, by the time you are as old as I am, you will be the best pearl dealer in all of our country and you Can teach your son everything I have taught you."
That was the happiest day of my life, that clay four months ago, and yet it was not all happy. Besides the embarrassment when my father had said, "Ramón, pull down your cuffs," there was also a big fear that kept worrying me.
As my father explained everything I had to learn, I feared that not soon would I have a chance to sail with the fleet. For many years I had dreamed of the time when I would be old enough to go. When you are sixteen, my father had said, you can sail with me and I will teach you how to dive in the deep water. Many times he had said this, and I had counted the weeks until I would be sixteen. But now that I was sixteen at last, I could not learn to dive for pearls until I learned many other things.
There is a small window in our office. It is only a slit in the stone and set high in the wall, and it looks more like an opening in a jail than a window. It was built that way so that not the smallest thief can squeeze through. Yet it gives a fine view of the beach and the Bay of La Paz. Furthermore, the men who work there on the beach opening the shells cannot tell whether they are being watched or not, which sometimes is a good thing.
On this morning as I sat at my desk I could see the five blue boats of our fleet riding at anchor. Water casks and coils of rope and supplies lay on the beach ready to be carried aboard. My father strode back and forth, urging the men to hurry for he wanted to catch the outgoing tide.
The tide would turn in less than three hours, but in that time I hoped to examine all of the pearls that lay on my desk. There were still nine of them to look at and weigh and duly note in the ledger, so quickly I set to work.
Under the desk, wrapped in a neat bundle, were my singlet, cotton pants, and a long, sharp blade my
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